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by ummeiko » Sun Jan 30, 2011 11:41 pm
Let's see... I've actually been relatively cold-free this winter (a happy side affect of the otherwise saddening having to quit my daycare job... but I was picking up any cold the kids got...)
Believe it or not, a runny nose is a good thing, as disgusting and obnoxious as it is to deal with. It means your system is flushing the irritants out of your sinuses and nasal passages. I actually have this really weird thing where I don't like Kleenexes, so I tend to go for really soft paper towels.
Sleep is good. If your body wants to sleep, let it.
It doesn't sound like you're congested, as your nose is runny runny, but do what you can to stay hydrated. Take hot showers. Drink hot water/tea as warm as you can get - the more steam, the better. Use a humidifier if you have one. Drink a lot of water, barring that, some clear broth (hence the chicken soup remedies...), and possibly some orange juice - vitamin C is good for your immune system. I have a friend who swears by cranberry juice as well. Just make sure what juice you're drinking is a healthy amount of "juice" and not just sugary. Ie, Tropicana Orange Juice is good... Sunny D not as much. When I was little, mom used to have us drink small amounts of 7-up... generally warmer than usual and a little flat. I'm not sure why, but it seemed to be okay.
If you get a fever, that's generally a good thing, medically speaking. It means your immune system is kicking into gear and you're actually fighting your cold. It also means, however, that you're probably at the most contagious.
Wash your hands a lot. Sanitize them if you wish... hand sanitizers vary in effectiveness - some are honestly just jumping on the bandwagon. To me, nothing is more important than a good antibacterial hand soap (follow it with a moisturizer or hand lotion if you want and are worried about your hands drying out... just be careful if it's overly scented to not irritate your senses too much).
I like cough syrups myself (particularly Thermacare), though since you don't, you might want to look into pill forms of cold medicine. I know dayquil/nyquil make some pill forms. As always with any kind of meds, check the side effects. A lot of cold meds will make you even more drowsy. And it's recommended that you don't take multi-symptom meds unless you have 3/4 of the symptoms. In other words, if you just have a cough, take just a cough medicine, instead of one that treats cough, headache, nausea, and congestion. No sense in throwing meds at your body that it doesn't need.
Sleep. Sleep and rest are really important, this is when your body is best recovering. One of the bad side affects of the "work work work" culture is that we rarely get enough time off to really recover... we tend to get pressured to going back to work/school after one day (if we even get a day off at all), and sometimes that's not enough. Sleep sleep sleep.
As always, if your symptoms worsen, or persist beyond a week or so, make a doctor's appointment to make sure it isn't anything worse than a common cold.
